plastic free

Keeping safe and healthy during the COVID-19 global pandemic is removing much of the gains we have made in reducing plastic use and is creating new waste issues. Grocery stores around the country are not allowing re-usable bags (and bans are being put on hold), coffee shops are refusing to refill personal mugs, and as ... read more

Help make the San Juan Islands “Plastic Free by the Sea”! This year’s Great Islands Clean-up is on Saturday, April 18, 2020. Join the county-wide greening event and collect litter from public beaches and roadways. There will be litter clean-up events happening on Orcas, San Juan, Lopez and Shaw Islands this year. Stay tuned for ... read more

Did you know that we use over 500 million plastic straws in the United States every day? And that by the year 2050 there will be more plastic trash in the ocean than fish? Friends of the San Juans, San Juan County Solid Waste and Marine Resources Committee, Orcas Recycling Services, and Lopez Solid Waste ... read more

On October 25th, the San Juan County Council passed an ordinance that will ban single use plastic bags in the county as of May 1, 2017! Thank you to everyone who helped make this happen – Friday Harbor and Spring Street International middle schoolers who testified at the hearing (and pictured above), Friends supporters who ... read more